Chapter 249: Demon-Sealing Box

Chapter 249: Demon-Sealing Box

"My formation disk... broke? How is that possible?! That was my Tokugawa family’s Demon-Suppressing Disk!"

Tokugawa Kazuya couldn’t believe it.

Ever since the spiritual revival, the Tokugawa family had exorcised countless ghosts and spirits. In today's Osaka Hyakki Yagyō, one of the core forces resisting the evil spirits was precisely their Tokugawa family. You could say, when it comes to exorcism, their family's onmyōji were absolute professionals.

Something like this had never happened before.

The formation disk... actually shattered?!

You have to understand, this formation disk was a spiritual artifact brought out from their mysterious ancestral shrine!

Tokugawa Kazuya hadn’t even recovered from the shock of the disk shattering when a cold gust of yin wind swept toward him.

“Crap!”

Sensing that chilling murderous intent, he immediately formed a hand seal. A talisman ignited with ghostly blue flames flew from his sleeve, landing on the ground and transforming into a three-eyed white wolf—one of his shikigami, Banhina, adept at both offense and defense.

He had gone through a lot to form a contract with this shikigami.

“Go, Banhina! Stop her!”

The three-eyed white wolf let out a howl and charged at the Bone Porcelain Woman.

The next second, it was swatted apart by a swipe of her ghost claw, torn into fluttering talisman scraps.

"How—how is that possible?!"

Tokugawa Kazuya’s eyes widened.

Even his strongest shikigami had been instantly destroyed by this cursed spirit.

What level

was

this thing?!

But he’d watched the entire process when the C Province Exorcist Division had contained this cursed spirit. Back then, it wasn’t even close to this strong.

At most, it was just slightly stronger than KSC-01 and KSC-02.

“Mr. Wang Rui, I think we need to reopen talks with the Governor of the C Province Exorcist Division,” Tokugawa Kazuya said, face pale, retreating step by step.

But the Bone Porcelain Woman strolled toward him like she was taking a walk in the park.

She wasn’t in any rush to attack, just flickering casually around him from front to back, left to right—like a cat toying with a mouse.

“Mr. Wang Rui? Wang Rui?!”

Tokugawa Kazuya looked back—there was no sign of Wang Rui.

Even Wang Rui’s subordinates had retreated.

At some point, the entire conference hall had been emptied, leaving him there all alone.

“B*stards!” Tokugawa Kazuya trembled with rage.

And right then, the Bone Porcelain Woman’s hand wrapped around his throat.

Crack

—twisted his neck into two segments.

…

“Governor Chen, I think there might’ve been a little... misunderstanding between us,” Wang Rui said while holding Chen Huaian’s hand, tears and snot running down his face, an ingratiating smile plastered across his old, wrinkled features.

“After giving it some serious thought, I believe the cursed spirit should be handled by whoever contained it first. Your C Province Exorcist Division is fully capable of handling it—it’s best if you take it back.”

“Is that so?” Chen Huaian flashed two rows of pearly white teeth. “Mr. Wang, you’re being too modest. The Wang Family has many talents. This cursed spirit is strong—perfect to place in your family mansion as a guardian spirit.”

“No, no way…” Wang Rui looked like he’d just eaten a frog.

Putting

that

thing in the Wang Family estate?

That’s not a guardian spirit—it’d turn the place into a haunted house!

“Of course we can continue containing it,” Chen Huaian continued. “But when we did it last time, we used up a lot of resources. If we want to do it again, we just don’t have enough. After all, we’re just a regional Exorcist Division. Resources are limited. Right now, we don’t even have enough funds for helicopter fuel to get back.”

He gently pushed away Wang Rui’s wrinkly old hand, looking helpless. “So, maybe... let’s just forget it?”

“Our Wang Family can provide the resources! Whatever you need, just say it!”

Wang Rui was no fool.

He instantly realized Chen Huaian was fishing for benefits.

Fine, let him fish. As long as he took that Bone Porcelain Woman away, he’d agree to anything.

He was really at his wit’s end.

Nowadays, each powerful family had managed to find one or two mysterious factions to partner with—like Kunlun Immortal Palace, Great Thunder Monastery, and so on, all representative of powerful mystical forces.

These families supplied talent.

The mysterious factions supplied resources.

But there were only so many of those factions to go around. The cake was already mostly eaten. The Wang Family wasn’t willing to fall behind, so they had to bring someone in from outside Daxia.

He’d thought this new partner was legit. The guy had hyped himself up as some kind of spiritual pillar of ghost-slaying in Neon Country. Turned out he was all flash, no substance. Sure, his flashy skills looked great, but they were useless. Still got one-shot by the cursed spirit.

“You’re saying I can name any price I want?” Chen Huaian looked Wang Rui in the eyes. This time, he’d learned his lesson. He knew these noble families were loaded, so he decided to go big: “I want 100 billion.”

“How much?!” Wang Rui was stunned.

Sure, money wasn’t as valuable as before, but the currency system hadn’t collapsed.

They still needed money to trade resources with other factions, and sometimes they bartered.

But taking out 100 billion in one go would seriously hurt the Wang Family.

“Governor Chen, it’s just a cursed spirit. Does it really cost that much to contain it again?” Wang Rui didn’t dare get angry with him. He tried to stay calm: “Why don’t you just tell me what specific resources you need? I’ll get them for you.”

“Blood of a Nascent Soul-stage demon beast. Go find it.”

“…What?” Wang Rui froze.

Chen Huaian continued: “Also Spirit Crystals, Primordial Heaven-Mending Pills, top-tier spiritual artifacts—you can give me those instead if you'd like.”

No one from the Wang Family had ever gotten into Kunlun Immortal Palace.

But they had heard plenty from other families.

According to what they’d learned, the first step to becoming immortal in Kunlun was Qi Refining, followed by Foundation Establishment, Golden Core, Nascent Soul—and only after that came the Divine Transformation stage.

Qi Refining cultivators were comparable to Marshal-level. Foundation Establishment was equivalent to Marshal to King level. Golden Core was equal to Emperor level. Right now, there weren’t even any Emperor-level demons or cursed spirits, yet Chen Huaian just casually asked for blood from a Divine Transformation beast?

And claimed it was needed to suppress the cursed spirit.

Did

he

even have that stuff?

“Please, don’t joke around… Where am I supposed to find blood from a Divine Transformation beast…” Wang Rui smiled bitterly.

“If you don’t have it, then give me 100 billion.”

Chen Huaian’s fingers moved slightly in the pocket of his coat.

The Bone Porcelain Woman, who had already killed the onmyōji, stepped out of the broken doors one slow step at a time.

Wherever she passed, the floor was paved in blood porcelain and frost coated everything. Her eerie, enchanting face twisted at an unnatural angle, crimson eyes locking directly onto Wang Rui.

That one glance nearly made Wang Rui’s soul leave his body.

“O-okay, okay! I don’t have 100 billion on hand right now, but I—I’ll give you all my available liquid assets first!”

As he spoke, Wang Rui pulled out a black card with golden edges and shoved it into Chen Huaian’s hand.

“There’s over 40 billion in this one. Let’s count it as 40 billion! I’ll transfer the other 60 billion right away! Please, I’m begging you—just suppress that cursed spirit!”

Chen Huaian passed the black card to Zhao Ying behind him to check.

Nowadays, national-level threats like Neon’s demon blade Muramasa or the vampire ancestor of the Balkans could go for tens or even hundreds of billions.

The Bone Porcelain Woman being worth a hundred billion? Totally fair.

Honestly, he even thought he’d underpriced her.

“Governor, 47.8 billion. It’s legit.”

Zhao Ying nodded at Chen Huaian, full of admiration.

Just that morning, she’d been complaining to Xiang Xiaoyuan, saying Chen Huaian had dumped ten billion into a game and was about to run out. How was the C Province Exorcist Division supposed to operate after that?

Then their Governor came out of closed-door cultivation and immediately pulled in a massive amount of emergency funding.

Getting things done takes money.

Chen Huaian gave Strawberry Bear and Shrimp King a little push.

The three cursed spirits started brawling again.

Strawberry Bear turned into a five-story-tall super bear. Shrimp King casually possessed a corpse and grabbed a sniper rifle.

The sheer scale of the fight left Wang Rui utterly speechless.

After 300 intense rounds, the Bone Porcelain Woman “barely breathing” returned to her porcelain bottle. Zhao Ying immediately took out the wooden box Chen Huaian had prepared and sealed her inside.

“Th-that wooden box… it can suppress a cursed spirit that strong?”

Wang Rui looked at the wooden box in a daze.

“That’s right, Mr. Wang, you may not know this, but this is the Demon-Sealing Box. I paid a heavy price to craft it. There are only a few of them in the entire C Province Exorcist Division,” Chen Huaian explained with a smile—

In reality, this thing was just a pill or sword case from the Sword Pavilion. He had tons of them.

He’d ordered a batch from Sword Pavilion and stashed them all in the C Province Exorcist Division warehouse. There were still over a hundred sitting in storage.

Wang Rui stared at the box and swallowed hard.

This was a treasure.

If he could buy one with money, that’d be a steal.

Other factions would only trade for something like this.

He asked cautiously, “Um, Governor Chen... would you be willing to sell me one or two Demon-Sealing Boxes?”

“Well…” Chen Huaian hesitated for three seconds, then finally nodded reluctantly.

“We’re all exorcists here, all Daxia people. Daxia people don’t trick Daxia people… I’ll sell it to you for 10 billion each. I can let you buy up to five. Please understand—this is the best I can offer.”

“

Hiss

—10 billion each?! Can I pay with diamonds, antiques, or calligraphy?”

“Nope. Only cash. Gold is also acceptable.”